Often Irreverent, Mostly Rational Blog for Fans of the Toronto Blue Jays. One Day, We'll Be Perfect.

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Thud

Well, that didn't go quite as planned, did it?

It would be easy to start assessing blame and pointing fingers at this point by questioning why Canada left its best starter on the shelf for the entire tournament, or wondering what was going through Matt Stairs' head as he left six runners on base by flailing at pitches out of the zone. But none of that is going to help put Canada back in this year's event, so why bother?

(But is there a chance that this two-and-out result might help quiet the cult of the Ernie Whitt? Because that shit should pretty much end right about now.)

Maybe at this point, we can just tip our newly purchased Team Canada caps towards Chris Denorfia and Chris Cooper and Jason Grilli and the entire Italian team, who played a hell of a game when it counted. In a knockout tournament like this one, these things are going to happen.

And as we're sitting here feeling like a pile of beaver turd, somewhere in Arizona, Ryan Dempster is regaling someone with his Harry Carey impression. Prick.

Great. Put Richmond on the mound against Italy and have Perkins go against Venezuela. Sure, maybe they'll squeak by Italy but then they're going to get HAMMERED when they face a lineup of actual major leaguers.

Okay, but how's about this: Put Richmond (or whoever your best pitcher is) against the U.S., and then play it out from there. If Richmond holds them to a couple of runs, maybe Canada squeaks one out in the first game of the tourney and gives itself some slack to send out Johnson against Venezuela.

If (big if) we beat USA with Richmond, we face Venezuela with Johnson, and if/when we lose we face the USA with Perkins. If Richmond loses, we need to win out with Johnson and Perkins. The problem in this tournament wasn't that we didn't use Richmond, it's that we needed a starter other than Richmond to pitch well, and neither did.

If you are accepting that you're going to lose to the Americans, then put Perkins in against them to toss BP, then Richmond against Italy to keep you in the tournament and Johnson against Venezuela.

Whatever. It Canada had even just ONE (1!!!!) major-league calibre pitcher who could have pitched for three innings, it could have made the difference, and we wouldn't have to sit here sick with hatred at Ryan Dempster.

I think if you put Perkins in against USA then you still put Johnson in against Italy. In a 3 on 3 team match it's a legitimate strategy to concede the top match to put your 1 and 2 against their 2 and 3 in that order. If their 3 beats your 2 then you were screwed anyways, because their 2 was probably going to beat your 2, but in any event you don't put your 2 against their 1 and your 3 against their 3.

I completely thought that Perkins should have been in against the US. Concede the game you might not win, and make sure you win the one you need to win. Then we have Richmond for the all important game against Venezuala. We KNEW we didn't have pitching going into the tournement, and wasted our number two on the less important game. Sure, if we beat the States, things are great, but that was unlikely from the beginning. We let a good, but lucky game in '06 coach this tournement, and that was stupid.